Houston named nation's top real estate market, according to study

What does a dip in mortgage rates mean for the housing market?

**EDITOR'S NOTE: The video above is from a previous report** For the fourth week in a row, the average rate for a 30-year mortgage dipped. What does that mean if you're trying to buy or sell your home?

HOUSTON - It might be an understatement to say how crazy the real estate market has been over the last couple of years. However, a recent study said Houston's real estate market has been bustling across all real estate sectors.

MORE: Housing market could tumble into a 'deep freeze' if US defaults on its debt

Researchers at Storage Cafe examined how the state's relative affordability and business-friendly environment, have had people moving to Space City in droves. This in turn gave a huge push to the property development market.

Checking in on the Houston housing market

FOX 26's Ruben Dominguez speaks with some of the top realtors in Houston about what the housing market looks like right now.

It's not just Houston, however, Texas, in general, has been seeing booming real estate activity. While Houston was named the top real estate market, San Antonio was named immediately afterward, followed by Austin, then Fort Worth, and Dallas as the 5th highest.

In fact, over the last decade, Houston has logged massive real estate additions which were broken down by single-family homes, office sectors, and retail just to name a few. See below for a complete examination:

Single-family homes: around 55,600 units – the largest number of single-family homes being permitted in the nation. 2021 and 2022 were the best years of the decade for residential construction.
Multifamily: Permits for almost 90K new apartments.
Office sector: Corporate relocations helped lead to a lot of Houston's office growth. Second only to NYC, Houston's office sector swelled by 27M square feet.
Industrial: Industrial space grew by almost 65 million square feet (1st nationally).
Self-storage: Houston self-storage sector also experienced an impressive surge in new construction, answering to its residents' complex needs for space. About 5.7M square feet of storage space was added to the local inventory over the past ten years.
Retail: Cash registers were ringing, with 12 million square feet of new retail construction. That propelled Houston to no. 2 in the U.S. in this regard — second only to NYC, with 18 million square feet.

New rules on mortgage fees that may have some people with stronger credit scores paying more

Controversy is buzzing over new mortgage rules taking effect Monday: higher fees for homebuyers with good credit, and lower fees for people with lower credit. However, mortgage experts say that’s not the whole story.

To see the full report and how other cities compared, click here.